What about the hostages left?

After the release of six more hostages kidnapped by FARC, the fate of the ones who remain captive is uncertain due to the Colombian government states that it will not release guerrilla members in exchange. They are a group of 16 people, formed by military, police and civil hostages.

For FARC the hostages are either military or political prisoners, the same as the guerrilla members who are detained in the country's prisons. Along these lines, the revolutionary force expects to exchange its prisoners with the ones from the government. In the other hand, for the Colombian government the idea is not valid. That is why the releases by FARC have been unilateral.

Regardless of that, the ones who are in the middle of the storm and who get mostly affected by all this are the hostages themselves, the same as, in my opinion, the soldiers, policemen and "private" guerrillas who are the ones who face the enemy and risk their freedom and lives.The government leaders, the top military commanders and the guerrilla leaders are away from the battle field, safe and sound. In most of the cases, the hostages are poor people or, at least, people who do not have anything to do directly with the conflict. The "private" guerrillas are, I think, poor people who do not have more choice than joining the illegal groups which brainwash them. In all the chances, they loose.

The Colombian ex senator Piedad Cordoba, the one who is accused of benefit FARC, the one who was nominated for the Nobel Prize that Barak Obama won and the one who mediates between the Colombian government and the revolutionary group, assured that by this year's June all the hostages will be released, despite the government questions the FARC releasing methods and the guerrilla actual proposes.

We Colombians hope that the ex senator is right and this releases could be a first step for an agreement between both sides, and therefore the achievement of the so-wanted peace that we really need for us and for our children. I do not know whether we can agree the so-called Humanitarian Exchange, I do not know either whether that could be the answer. What I do know is that I don not agree with that possibility.

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